Hello Project Ezra, and for
those in the States, Happy Thanksgiving!
I hope you have a wonderful and relaxing day. I also hope and pray that many of you are
getting prepared to head out tonight or tomorrow morning to share the gospel
with the Black Friday crowds. For those
of you who have not chosen to brave the crowds to snap up that really cheap
Christmas present or latest TV/Computer/Game System/Smart Phone, Black Friday
is by far the busiest shopping day of the year, and the evening/morning crowds
at your local Walmart or Best Buy can provide a good opportunity to share the
gospel through tracting or open-air preaching.
Do be careful, since some of the crowds will be on private property, and
some late night shoppers can be cranky (DON’T go alone), but don’t miss the opportunity. Millions will be out, many of them seeking to
further support their idolatrous, me-centered lifestyle, and desperately in
need of Christ, the only true source of
meaning and purpose.
We have used Acts 17 as our Black
Friday/Thanksgiving suggested reading in the past, and it is still a great
choice. While those at the Areopagus
spent their time looking for new ideas and beliefs, many in our day spend their
lives looking for the newest fashion, the newest electronic device, or one of a
host of other things that promise fulfillment that they cannot and never will
satisfy. They are really very much
alike, below the surface, so this passage provides a great message. I’ve also included a couple other passages,
which you may want to use in place of (or more likely along with) Acts 17,
which address some of the same issues.
You may also want to include several passages regarding being thankful
to God for what we have already received, and particularly for the greatest
gift of all, salvation through the blood of Christ.
I’ll be heading out for Black Friday
myself soon (I work in the retail industry, and don’t have an option), and I
look forward to hearing your testimonies and seeing your videos and pictures
when I get back, sometime tomorrow. I’ll
be praying for the outreach, and God willing, will be heading out Saturday
evening to share with and preach to those visiting a local Christmas
event. I’ll be praying for all of you,
and would appreciate your prayers as well, for Black Friday and the outreach as
well. May God be glorified as His word
is preached!!
All for His glory,
Dan
Paul
in Athens
Now while Paul was waiting for them
at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full
of idols. So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons,
and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. Some of
the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also conversed with him. And some said,
“What does this babbler wish to say?” Others said, “He seems to be a preacher
of foreign divinities”—because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. And
they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this
new teaching is that you are presenting? For you bring some strange things to
our ears. We wish to know therefore what these things mean.” Now all the
Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing
except telling or hearing something new.
So Paul, standing in the midst of
the Areopagus, said: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very
religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I
found also an altar with this inscription, ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore
you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and
everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made
by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed
anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.
And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the
earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling
place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and
find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for
“‘In him we live and move and have
our being’;
as even some of your own poets have
said,
“‘For we are indeed his offspring.’
Being then God's offspring, we ought
not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image
formed by the art and imagination of man. The times of
ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because
he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man
whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him
from the dead.”
Proverbs
30:7-9 - Two things I ask of you;
deny them not to me before I die:
Remove far from me falsehood and lying;
give me neither poverty nor riches;
feed me with the food that is needful for me,
lest I be full and deny you
and say, “Who is the Lord?”
or lest I be poor and steal
and profane the name of God.
deny them not to me before I die:
Remove far from me falsehood and lying;
give me neither poverty nor riches;
feed me with the food that is needful for me,
lest I be full and deny you
and say, “Who is the Lord?”
or lest I be poor and steal
and profane the name of God.
Matthew
6:19-34 - “Do not lay up for yourselves
treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in
heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in
and steal. For where your
treasure is, there your heart will be also.
“The eye is the
lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of
light, but if your eye is bad,
your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness,
how great is the darkness!
“No one can serve two masters, for
either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the
one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
“Therefore I tell you, do not be
anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about
your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more
than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor
gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more
value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his
span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of
the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even
Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so
clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown
into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore
do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or
‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your
heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God
and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
“Therefore do not be anxious about
tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is
its own trouble.
